Ungrateful turtle, chicken abuse, open wounds

On my way home last night I saw a number of vehicles slowing down.  I saw the reason for the deceleration, a live turtle was on the road.  I saw a line of cars about 100 feet behind me and made a command decision to stop dead in my tracks to create a turtle safety barrier and threw on the 4 way flashers.  This was a side road with something like a 35 mph speed limit.  I would have not attempted the same maneuver on a major roadway.  I hopped out of the truck and approached the turtle, what I would categorize as a snapper that was not that big.  He was fully retracted but his shell looked intact which I was glad to see.  I later looked this type of turtle up, it’s actually called a Florida Softshell Turtle and is not a snapper at all, it just bites like one.

So I picked him up and made it to the median before he started thrashing about violently.  He was small enough that his feet could reach my hands that were on either side of his shell.  As he scratched me he was also throwing his head around, trying to find anything he could bite.  It got bad enough that I sat him down but he immediately tried to head back into the roadway so I cut him off.

He again retracted into his shell as I reached down and picked him up again.  As I did I told him to not be stupid, I was trying to help him.  I must speak turtle because this time he remained passive as I carried him to the waterway 75 feet away.    Another successful turtle mission was in the books.

I beat Cindy home last night so I tended to the chickens.  When I was done, instead of getting them back in the coop I told Cindy we should let them run around some more since they love it so much.  I told Cindy I would put them in later.  Well the rest of my evening became consumed with some running club drama that made me totally forget that the chickens were still outside.  In fact I did not remember until Cindy told me when she went out to check on the hens this morning they were waiting at the screen door to greet her.

I felt terrible and couldn’t believe I forgot about them.  I also felt lucky they survived the night intact from predators.  Evidently the chickens did still retreat to their coop overnight based on the chicken poop in there this morning.  Still, it was a big brain fart that can’t happen again.

So anyway like I referenced above there was a lot of drama last night that was running club related.  For quite awhile there have been problems going on that have been treated with band aids instead of stitches.  As a result the wound continues to ooze.  Anyway, last nights drama resulted in me ripping the band aids off and has opened the door to me potentially divorcing myself from the dozens of responsibilities I have carried for the club for approaching 9 years.  The fact that things have been allowed to even get to this point just further illustrates the problem.   I don’t know yet what the ultimate end result will be but the idea of relieving myself of literally tons of work and responsibility sounds pretty appealing.  My sense of responsibility to others not involved in the drama does however weigh on my mind.